Dispensing timely justice

We have thousands of cases lingering on for decades, and there is no hope that they will see the light of day

The cabinet has come up with a novel idea to install a parallel structure of justice dispensation to overseas Pakistanis. How far it is tenable under the law, and what would be its softies is yet to be ascertained. But the proposition itself is quite interesting; and irrespective of its practicability or legal mandate that it would derive from the judiciary, it underscores the exigency that is there in our system owing to lack of speedy and timely justice. This aspect is a basic ingredient of any civil society, and it is high time our judicial format was reformed for the good; and the cumbersome discrepancies in it, primarily due to bureaucratic riddles, were done away with.

British Prime Minister Winston Churchill had inquired and quipped during wartime: if courts are working then the confidence of the people will live on in the State. This phenomenon is not time barred. This is where we have lacked, and not been able to take a stand. We have hundreds and thousands of cases lingering on for decades, and there is no hope that they will ever see the light of day. The reason is not lethargy on the part of the judiciary, but an inherent structure of obstacles and undesired format of prosecution from down to top that is acting as an impediment.

Why should the number of judges be determined, why not umpteenth judicial vacancies created until and unless the backlog is dispensed with? The executive needs to give it a thought. The judiciary time and again has brought up this lack of staff issue in all humility. Why not just simplify the process of registration of cases, their time-slogged investigation, duly filing of challan and ultimately a specific time-bound decision. We can do it, if there is a will. And this is where we have kept our fingers crossed.

This government deserves due credit for thinking out of the box. Initiatives such as health card, digitisation of revenue and land record, building dams, electronic voting machines and right of vote to expatriates and so on are landmark in essence. Likewise, it has to reform the civil and judicial bureaucracy, and ensure that justice is at the beck and call of the litigant. This is how we can erect an ordained welfare state. Inducing parallel tiers will lead to civil discord.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 18^th, 2022.

Like Opinion & Editorial on Facebook, follow @ETOpEd on Twitter to receive all updates on all our daily pieces.